A frustrating bug appears to be affecting Galaxy Watch 5 Pro units following the rollout of the One UI 8 Watch update, with users reporting a significantly malfunctioning battery indicator. The issue, which Samsung did not address with the recent January 2026 security patch, revolves around inaccurate battery level reporting rather than an actual drain on battery life.
According to numerous user reports (1, 2, 3),, the watch now displays a deceptively fast charging rate. However, once disconnected from the charger, the battery percentage plunges rapidly—sometimes dropping to 75% within just a few minutes after showing a full charge. A milder form of this behavior has also been noted on the standard Galaxy Watch 5, where the indicator often immediately falls to around 98% after charging.
The problem seems to stem from a miscalibrated battery indicator within the One UI 8 Watch software. For affected users, this creates practical headaches in daily use, making it difficult to gauge true battery life and plan charging sessions effectively. Unfortunately, common troubleshooting steps like clearing the cache or performing a factory reset have proven ineffective, pointing to a deeper software issue that requires an official patch from Samsung.
The persistence of this bug is particularly frustrating given the prolonged wait many users endured for the One UI 8 Watch update to arrive on older models. The silver lining for potential buyers is that this issue seems confined to the Watch 5 series models that received the update; newer watches shipping with One UI 8 Watch out-of-the-box do not appear to be affected.
We hope Samsung acknowledges this problem and delivers a fix in an upcoming software update. We’ll keep you updated on this. So, stay tuned.
